


I'm sorry

by Avanimatics



Category: Haikyuu!!, Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Blood, Crossover, Heavy Angst, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Magic, Violence, Witches
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:13:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 20,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25078936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Avanimatics/pseuds/Avanimatics
Summary: Yamaguchi has been a magical boy for a few weeks, while tsukishima has fought the witches for 3 years now, yamaguchi often felt insecure about his power and how to use it, but when a witch attacks the training camp, they will have to fight.
Relationships: Tsukishima Kei/Yamaguchi Tadashi
Comments: 5
Kudos: 14





	1. Chapter 1

Prologue

“An Ace?” Kyubbey asked, the white fairy couldn’t understand the concept of an Ace, most humans would ask wishes to improve their health, their status, or their emotional state, but the request of Tsukishima Kei, the next candidate to become a magical boy, was something rather unexpected. “ I don’t really understand what you want to wish for, to become a magical boy.”  
Kei standed up from the sofa, and got nearer to the white fairy sitting in the table. “ How do I explain this…” he wondered, that day was already hard enough, after seeing his brother could never play in the court during all those matches, and after being witness of his despair, as he ripped his room apart, Kei was confused and lost seeing his brother, the one he always looked up to, in this state, all that time he and his brother were living in a lie, and this were the consequences of that illusion breaking down, he also felt disappointed, with himself, because he never questioned why he could never go to his brother’s matches, or why the older boys never talked of his brother, realizing that his brother lied to him the last three years made his blood boil, but now, if he payed the price of fighting beings called witches, he could get a wish, he could set things right, for himself, and for his brother.  
“In volleyball, there are a lot of positions, and one of them is the ace, He keeps the whole thing together, when the rival blocker have defeated the wing spikers, middle hitters, even the settler!, he is the last hope, he breaks through the other team’s walls, with all his force, he’s the coolest player in the match!!” he felt quite excited telling the white fairy about volleyball, everything was so surreal, but that made it even more exciting, but as he kept explaining, memories of the match came back, his brother, only able to cheer on the team, with no chance to play, Kei’s smile disappeared as the moment repeated in his mind. “my brother always wanted to be the ace, but, no matter how hard he tried… he could never reach that spot… but now I want to help him, I finally have a chance.”  
Kei looked down at the hall, he could see his brother’ room from the living room, the screaming had stopped and apparently he stopped to thumb all his stuff down, but Kei didn’t had the courage to enter in that room. “ this isn’t only for him to be happy, this wish, could save his life…” Kei remembered that Kyubbey told him about this monsters that fed on people’s misery. “if he continues in this state… he can fall victim to a witch..right?”  
“Of course he can.” Kyubbey explained. “witches can attack all humans, but they are naturally drawn closer to those who are facing a deep grief, and with your brother’s mental state in disturbance, his heart could be easily consumed by one of them.”  
“I see…” Kei said, his anger towards his brother quickly turned in fear, as he imagined him being attacked by a witch, maybe the witch would curse him, make him sick, or even make him end his own life, he had to avoid that, no matter what. “ I won’t only make my brother happy again with my wish, I’ll fight the witches, all of them, every single one!!!, I’ll protect him from all curses” Kei clenched his chest, he wanted to run, he was scared of fighting those monsters, but he had to in order to make a miracle happen, this was his chance to make something for him, “so. Kyubbey!!”

“I wish that my brother becomes the ace of Karasuno!!!”

“This is for his own good.”, he thought, but his thinking was interrupted by a piercing pain in his chest, he fell on his knees, suddenly he felt like his body was heavy, he curled up as he felt his whole being separated from his body “aghh!!” he cried out, as kyubbey watched from above, suddenly, from Kei’s chest, a bright red light fired up, as it left his body, he suddenly stopped to feel any pain at all.  
“this is your destiny” Kyubbey said “with your wish, the entropy of the universe has been reduced once again, and now, show me your new powers, become a magical boy.”  
Kei instinctively reached the red light that was above him, as he grabbed the red light, he felt his consciousness drift away.

“Kei? Kei wake up!!” a voice said, at first, Kei didn’t recognize it, but as his vision adjusted, he figured out that it was his brother, he was holding his shoulders, trying to get him up, he could tell that his tears had already dried away. “what happened? I heard something in the living room, and you were in the floor, and you wouldn’t answer me!!!” akiteru cried out, more tears dripping off from his face, seeing his brother in such a state hit him as hard as seeing his face of disappointment earlier during the match.  
Kei thought what to say, maybe the thing that happened with kyubbey was only a dream, maybe he was so tired from that day that he collapsed in the living room, but he felt something in his hand, he looked at his hand as he opened it, he saw a red gem, with a shape similar to an egg, that was his soul gem, the symbol that he was a magical boy now, that meant that his wish could have come true, he smiled, surprising Akiteru.  
“Don’t worry” Kei said, as he wiped his brother’s tears, and as he hid his soul gem inside his hoddie “it’s ok now, everything is fine.”  
Kei reached his brother to hug him, he wanted to console him, to tell him that he would be able to play for the first time, omitting the contract he made minutes ago, Akiteru looked at Kei, seeing his brother happy after all the stuff that happened that day relieved him a bit, maybe not all hope was lost “I’m glad you’re ok.” he said softly, as he returned the hug.  
The two brothers felt safe, embraced with other, not letting go, after all the despair of that day, there was still hope, even if Akiteru ignored the deal his brother just did to make a miracle happen, even if Kei was oblivious of his fate as a magical boy, it didn’t matter now.

Everything would be ok.  
Or so they thought, as Kyubbey looked the scene outside the window, pleased with his new acquisition.

[IMG=SXH]

Years later…

Chap 1.

In order to give hope....

The sun was just revealing itself between the skyscrapers in Tokyo, as another day in the training camp started for the Karasuno Volleyball team, after their defeat to Seijoh academy, they had a chance to play against some of the most important volleyball teams in Tokyo, to prepare themselves hopefully for a rematch.  
All members of the team were totally focused on their extensive sessions of training and practice matches, everyone had their head in the game, except for 2 of the first years students of Karasuno high, and one of those two was Yamaguchi Tadashi, a magical boy.  
He was the first one to be awake of the team, or rather, he never got to sleep last night. Yamaguchi yawned as he lazily dragged his feet across the dorm halls they were staying, “this duty is really taking a toll on me” he thought as he reached the bathroom, he opened the tap and poured some water in his face, hoping that it would wake him up, but as he rubbed his eyes and looked more closely in the mirror, he noticed that his eye bags were visible once again, for a moment he freaked out, they weren’t as large yesterday, “…what would they say if they looked at me like this?” he wondered, sneaking out of the training camp at night to hunt any familiar nearby was really a tiring job for him.  
Maybe he couldn’t stop being so tired this days, but at least he could hide such hideous eye bags, he summoned from his ring a blue gem that was decorated with linings of gold, his soul gem, he bought his soul gem near his face, and used a little bit of magic to erase his eye bags, using magic to modify his appearance wasn’t new, in fact, changing his appearance has part of his personal, unique magic, the gem shined as the eye bags disappeared completely, he looked again at the mirror to make sure they were gone, and they were indeed gone, which pleased Yamaguchi.  
As he kept looking at the mirror, he noticed his freckles once again, being honest, he really wanted to get rid of them with magic, he thought as he was getting ready to leave the bathroom. “but If I remove my freckles with magic, it would be too obvious.”  
“oI, Yamaguchi!!” A voice said, as an arm wrapped around Yamaguchi’s body, he shuddered as he was surprised by the entity, and dropped his soul gem in the sink, “Tanaka, you shouldn’t jump in Yamaguchi like that, You scared him!!” a softer voice said from behind. “Sugawara, Tanaka, Good morning.” Yamaguchi said as he catched his breath.  
“Did you sleep well?” Sugawara asked, and Yamaguchi doubted for a moment, he’s been lying to his teammates about his night activities way to often. “well..yeah, of course-I mean, why I shouldn’t be, right?” he said with a nervous smile.  
“Really?” Tanaka said, as he removed his arm from Yamaguchi’s body. “you’ve been yawning and losing balance in practice, you even ditch it some days!!! Is it too much for you?, Daichi’s kind of worried Y’know?”. Yamaguchi panicked, maybe they didn’t notice his eye bags, but they could tell the other symptoms of sleep depravation pretty well “hehe-yeah, practice matches have been really hard, and so tiring too, even if I get normal sleep”  
“Hey Yamaguchi!” Sugawara called, as he retrieved an egg shaped object from the sink. “what is this?” he said as he hold Yamaguchi’s soul gem, the freckled teen opened his eyes widely, he suddenly felt light weighted, panic took over, fearful of others finding out about his secret, he jumped closer and snatched the soul gem out of Suga’s arms in a violent way. “hey!!! Calm down” Tanaka said, seeing Yamaguchi’s unexpected reaction, Yamaguchi himself noticed what he had done, “I’m such an idiot.” he thought As he put his gem in his pocket. “I’m sorry!!!”he pleaded “this thing is… a family heirloom” he said, referring to the gem. “it’s said that it gives you good luck, but it’s really fragile too, I didn’t want you to accidentally break it” he kept elaborating his lie, his heart beating at an uneven speed. “but still.. sorry for reacting like that..”.  
Sugawara was convinced of that explanation, his family had some heirlooms themselves, so it was understandable. “don’t worry.” He softly smiled. “I know those things are really important, just take care of it, and don’t forget that you have it in your pocket!!” he said as he left the bathroom. “,we’ll be waitin downstairs for the practice, don’t ditch it this time too could you?” Tanaka said, stuffing his hands in his pockets, “Daichi’s gonna get mad at you!!!”  
Yamaguchi sighted, he could attend this practice, there were no nearby witches today, so he could invest time in perfecting his float serve. “I’ll go downstairs in a moment!”  
Tanaka smiled and left the bathroom too, leaving Yamaguchi alone, he had to practice more, he wasn’t only a magical boy, he also had a responsibility with his team. “I’ll work harder for them.”, he thought, as he dried his face.  
\--------------‐-----------------------------------  
After having breakfast, the team was preparing for a practice match against fukurodani, but before that, they had some time to practice with their skills, almost everyone that came to the training camp was already stretching and heating up to begin training, everyone except.  
“Hey! Yamaguchi” Nishinoya said, as Yamaguchi finished his stretching. “have you’ve seen Tsukishima?”  
“Tsukii?, well..not really” the boy said, Tsukishima always preferred to ditch practice wherever he had the chance, so maybe he had gone to a less crowded area to listen some music, or he was fighting a witch somewhere. “he wasn’t with us when we had breakfast?” Yamaguchi asked.  
“Yeah, I think he has, so he probably isn’t that far right now, but he shouldn’t be ditching practice right now!!” Nishinoya groaned, not pleased that Tsukishima always disappeared in the worst moments. “what the hell could he be doing right now?”  
Yamaguchi knew the answer, but he couldn’t say a word, he had tried to make Tsukishima practice more in the nights, to compensate for the times they had to sneak out of practice to fight a witch, but he was reluctant to doing such thing.  
“Asahi isn’t here neither, but we gotta start now” Tanaka said, as he scratched his neck. “I’M gonna reach for them, maybe they fell asleep somewhere, I’l try not to take too long, ok?”  
“No problem”, Nishinoya said, while Yamaguchi nodded in response, Tanaka left the gym as everyone started their practice, Yamaguchi was getting a little angry at Tsukishima, he wasn’t really getting any better at volleyball, and he didn’t bother to teach him how to fight witches now that he knew the basics, but it didn’t matter now, he had to practice.  
“Hey…Nishinoya” Yamaguchi said, looking down, a little embarrassed for his request. “could you help me practice my float serve?” Nishinoya thought for a moment, at least Yamaguchi had more motivation than Tsukishima. “All right, let’s do it then”.  
The two were ready, in opposite sides of the net, the thing was simple, make a serve that was impossible to receive for the libero, if he ever wanted to play as a regular, he would have to improve a lot, including the floating serve”  
“All right!!, bring it on” Nishinoya exclaimed, getting into position to receive, Yamaguchi took a deep breath to soothe his fast heartbeat, he had done this several times, he tossed the ball into the air, and jumped, making sure to press the volleyball right in the center, but even with that, the ball kept spinning like usual, a serve that was easily received by Karasuno’s libero, Yamaguchi sighted, as he grabbed another one, “next!!”.  
Some time went by, but there was little to no improvement, Nishinoya kept receiving them all, Nishinoya, being a normal human, had better reflexes than a magical boy like him, that thought made him more frustrated, magical boys were supposed to be stronger, but he felt no difference, Nishinoya noticed this, his teammate was worried about something, but since Yamaguchi had always been quite anxious, it was difficult to pinpoint what was making him act like this.  
Yamaguchi prepared another serve, he jumped and hit the ball, and this time, the ball wasn’t spinning, but that joy disappeared as it crashed with the net, just like with that match with Sejioh. “dammit!” Yamaguchi grunted, what was missing? He had tried for so long, but nothing good came out. “try to hit it harder, so that it has more impulse” nishinoya said, trying to cheer Yamaguchi. “Let’s do one more.” Yamaguchi gritted his teeth, and tossed the ball in the air, he remembered that day way to well, the ball falling in their court, he had the chance to change the game’s course, but he had nothing, he was only a normal human back then, leaving the court almost in tears, he was weak, no matter what he did, his thoughts were raging inside of him so hard that he hit the ball with a lot of force, way too much force, more than what any human would, he realized the mistake, but it was too late, he didn’t had time to do anything else, as the ball hit nishinoya’s arm, making him lose balance, and falling.  
“Nonononono I’m sorry!!” Yamaguchi cried out, as he rushed towards Nishinoya, the whole team also saw that, that was probably the strongest serve they had ever seen. “please tell me your arm’s ok!!” he probably used part of his magic in that attack, that had never happened before. Nishinoya looked at Yamaguchi, and smirked, “I’ve never seen such a serve before, I couldn’t even save I-“ he stopped talking, as he grabbed his arm, it felt really hot from the impact, and it was quite painful, he grunted a little from the pain. “that doesn’t look good, Yamaguchi!!” Suga said as he helped Nishinoya get up. “more careful with those monstrous serves right!, maybe we should go to the infirmary first”  
“No!” Nishinoya protested, “this is nothing really!!”  
Yamaguchi felt dizzy, his heart was raising, his palms were sweaty, what had he done, he hurt one of his friends? He felt that just from his anger some magic manifested, injuring their libero, this was getting out of hand, he had to protect his friends from witches, not to hurt them  
“Are you ok?” Ennoshita asked, trying to snap Yamaguchi out of his state, Yamaguchi reacted, and as he looked around, he said.” I, ug, yes.. please….” He had to get out of there, “I need fresh air” Yamaguchi sprinted outside the gym, hoping that no one else was there

When he reached the outside of the gym, he let himself fall to the grasp, as he catched his breath, he still couldn’t believe what just happened, he had used without thinking some of his magic for that toss, what if he broke Nishinoya’ arm?, what if it happened again, guilt was building up in his mind, Yamaguchi closed his eyes, and wondered. “why am I like this?”  
he had only been a magical boy for a few weeks by now, after the match against sejioh, he was probably one of members who had it worst, he never managed to play for more than 5 minutes, if he was stronger like Asahi, had better skills like Kageyama, if he was faster, like Hinata, if he was cooler, like Tsukki, maybe we could have played more, maybe they could have won. He felt ashamed of the person he was, he wanted to change, even if he gave his life for a wish, he felt like this wish never came true.  
Suddenly, he felt even more dizzy than before, even if his heart rate was back to normal, he felt way too tired, he summoned his soul gem to make sure everything was ok with it, but as he opened his eyes again, he let out a muffled gasp, his soul gem wad strains of impurity all over the surface, the bright blue of the gem was replaced by a dark purple, “when did it get this dark” he questioned.  
It wasn’t good, he sometimes asked Tsukishima if he knew what would happen when soul gems got completely tainted, but he didn’t knee neither, and since kyubbey wasn’t around to ask him, they always had the doubt, but one thing was for sure, he didn’t want to find out, the green haired male took an object put of his pocket, it was a dark sphere, around the same size of a soul gem, decorated with gray markings all around it, a grief seed.  
He took the grief seed closer to his soul gem, and when the two made contact, the impurities from the soul gem slowly crossed to the grief seed, the dark purple was slowly replaced by the original bright blue, Yamaguchi still wondered why his soul gem had darkened that quickly in a few hours. “..maybe my nerves are burning my soul gem quicker than usual” he tought, and it made sense, after the incident with Nishinoya, with all of that stress flowing through his body, he felt like his energy was being drained, with this new thought, he felt worried again. If his nerves kept burning down his soul gem, he wouldn’t even be able to fight a familiar, if any minor inconvenience that caused Yamaguchi’s stress would taint his soul gen, he would use all the grief seed stock they had left. “maybe Tsukki won’t like to be with me anymore…”  
“Hey!! Yamaguchi” a voice said from the distance, making Yamaguchi’s thoughts stop in an instance, that voice was from. “Daichi..” Yamaguchi said, as he stood up from the grass, while turning his soul gem to it’s ring form . “are you ok? I heard about what happened and-“ the captain was interrupted when Yamaguchi freaked out, remembering what happened. “Nishiniya is ok?” Yamaguchi asked, still worried of his friend’s condition.  
“Yeah, the hit from that ball wasn’t that hard after all, but when we took him to the infirmary, he had some inflammation in his arm, but nothing serious” Daichi said, as he patted Yamaguchi’s back. “he might not like it, but he’ll have to rest for today if he wants to play tomorrow.” Yamaguchi sighted from relief, maybe he didn’t hurt his friend that bad at all, but he still felt quite guilty. “thanks goodness he’s ok, I’ really sorry for that fuss…”  
Daichi’s look change, he looked more serious now, he was gonna get scolded for something? Yamaguchi wondered. “it’s ok, but stop dodging the question.” The captain said firmly. “are YOU ok?” Yamaguchi felt shivers travel down his spine, what had he done, they found something related to magical boys? They were worried about something else?  
“Of course I am fine…wh-why wouldn’t I be?” Yamaguchi exclaimed, giving a shy smile. “we are worried about you, you and Tsukii are ditching practice way to often, you disappear in eating hours, and you also look more tired than anyone else.” Daichi said, wondering how to approach the topic. “Tsukishima is also like this, but it’s already an habit of his, but with you it was sudden, you aren’t hiding anything from us, right?”  
Yamaguchi’s legs were shaking, his heart was about to explode, he wanted to talk, but his tongue didn’t respond, he hated this, why was he like this? Why couldn’t he be more relaxed, Daichi just wanted to talk about something serious, but it felt like the end of the world, why couldn’t he change? Why didn’t his wish came true?  
“I-I was… Doing extra practice…I want to make a better float serve, but..I still get nervous with crowds, so I like to practice them alone…” he finally said. “Daichi thought for a moment, Yamaguchi did trained a lot with his float serve before the matches, and he sometimes preferred more quiet environments, it made sense. “I get it now, but… please remember.” Daichi said, as he put his hand in Yamaguchi’s shoulders. “we are still a team, no matter if we win or lose, if you really need to tell us something, if you feel down, just let us know alright?”  
“Daichi’s words were reassuring, but Yamaguchi would never be able to tell them the truth, “Daichi and the others don’t know anything.” He thought, if they knew about witches and magical boys, they would definitively freak out, and at a time like this, it wasn’t a good thing, if he kept protecting them from witches in the shadows, nothing could go wrong. “Thanks, Daichi-sempai” Yamaguchi gave a wider smile, Daichi still felt worried, he didn’t know what, but something felt odd to him, Yamaguchi’s smile didn’t felt all natural, but he has only a normal human, he couldn’t do much, he could talk about this with Ukai and Takeda if necessary, but for now, they had to practice, they would do the talking later that day. “ok then.”  
“I thought you two would be in practice already” a familiar voice said, making Yamaguchi’s eyes light up. “Tsukki!!” Yamaguchi said, as he rushed towards Tsukishima, to his discomfort, by some odd reason, being around Tsukishima made him feel safe, his heart slowed down, and his legs didn’t shake anymore, it felt good. “Tsukishima…. Were where you too?: Daichi asked, he seemed quite angry towards Tsukishima than usual. “I was practicing with the guys from Fukurodani, they needed blockers and they dragged me to their practice” Tsukii said, he said that like nothing, Tsukishima wasn’t bothered by anything, we always kept a straight face all day, no matter what, one of the reasons why Yamaguchi admired Tsukishima so much.  
“…ok then, you too, we are going to practice in OUR gym now” Daichi said, as he was heeding back to the gym, the two males responded at the same time. “yes!”.  
The two of them began walking towards the gym, Yamaguchi was surprised, was it really happening? Tsukki had finally found hid passion towards volleyball, he even felt a little proud oh his friend, making his lips turn into a little grin. Tsukishima quickly noticed his friend’s smile. “why are you smiling like that? You would stop smiling if you saw such a face in a mirror.” Tsukishima chuckled, salty as always. “hmm, nothing special, I just can’t believe that you finally wanted to train more, I can’t believe it to be honest.” Yamaguchi chuckled too.  
“and you shouldn’t believe it” Tsukishima admitted, Yamaguchi quickly picked up what his friend said, he felt a little disappointed, but it wasn’t surprising, making his smile disappear. “so…if you weren’t practicing, what were you up to?.  
“I was just tracking down a witch…” just as their lifes one day, the conversation took a different turn. “a witch!?” Yamaguchi freaked out, if a witch intruded the training camp, everyone could get really hurt. “where is it!!! Was it strong? I can’t feel it’s magic.” Tsukishima sighted, Yamaguchi always freaked out about nothing, kind of annoying, but he got used to it. “ don’t worry.” He said. “I was walking around the building when I felt it’ magic, but the witch was outside the camp, so I sneaked out to hunt it.” Yamaguchi kept listening to the blonde talking, as they were getting closer to the entrance. “and tell me, it was powerful? What attacks did you use? Did you save someone?” He said with excitement, Tsukii had been a magical boy for a couple of years now, compared to himself, Tsukii was a veteran, he probably slayed the witch like nothing, that’s why Tsukii was so cool.  
“None of that, the witch was really weak, but as I was about to kill it, it managed to slip away.”  
“But you didn’t chase after it?” Yamaguchi asked  
“Why would I, we already have grief seeds in stock, and if it ran away somewhere far from the camp, why should I care for it?” Tsukishima raised an eyebrow. Yamaguchi expected a more epic tale, something more exciting, but when he remembered what witches could do to people, he was getting more worried for the situation. “but.. what if that witch attacked more people, what if it killed someone?”  
“That’s not part of my business” Tsukishima replied. “remember that we are in Tokyo, we are intruders to the native magical boys from this area, and I don’t want more conflicts with them….”  
Yamaguchi understood, wasting magic in a territorial war for hunt grounds was never something that none of them liked, but still, he felt like just like with volleyball, even if he had more experience than him, Tsukishima didn’t found his passion to fight as a magical boy. “but if you had managed to defeat the witch quickly, you could have taken the grief seed quickly and no one would have noticed”  
“Being honest I didn’t wanted to kill the witch, just scaring it away was enough for me” the blonde said, looking down at his freckled teammate.” I just need the grief seeds to survive, if I have enough, why would I care about getting more?” Yamaguchi stopped in his steps, he felt like he had to say something to Tsukishima, he didn’t like that way of thinking at all. “But we magical boys are supposed to fight for our wishes…” Yamaguchi said, looking at the ring in his finger that housed his soul gem. “we are meant to fight the witches for the rest of our lifes!!, at least we should fight for one motivation, anything.” The green haired man stared at his friend’s face, no changes in his expressions. “I wanted to fight for my wish!!!! To be someone as cool as you!!, but then” Yamaguchi always had this question, for a long time.

“WHAT ARE YOU FIGHTING FOR?”

Tsukishima stopped walking, he didn’t had time to talk about his motivations, he just had something to say. “but if that wish doesn’t come true?” the blonde one said, in a more serious voice. “and if that wish backfired? Why would you keep fighting for something that could eventually cause you more pain?” Yamaguchi felt chills in his body with that statement, he sometimes felt like if his wish never came true, what if his wish couldn’t become true, even if he also wanted to save people, not getting anything out of risking his life would be awful, he also began to wonder about Tsukishima’s past, he wanted to know, but he never had the courage to ask him about it, he could only wonder if Tsukishima’s wish never came true, thinking about that made him go silent for the rest of the walk, Tsukishima kept looking at the gym’s door getting closer, Yamaguchi could tell that something was going on in Tsukki’s mind, but he couldn’t tell what, maybe he was remembering his wish?.  
Finally they made it to the gym’s doors.

Inside, they were greeted by Suga and the others “hey Yamaguchi, Tsukishima, everything ok? Suga asked the two. “yeah… I’m sorry for that before, I’m glad Nishinoya’s ok.” Yamaguchi replied, meanwhile Tsukishima just stared at the two of them. “fine, just finish the stretching before beginning training please” Suga said as he joined the others, Tsukishima rolled his eyes, why did he had to do stretching? his body was capable enough of doing any of that without prior effort, all supported by magic, stretching had on use for a magical boy like him, but he would never hear the end of Suga if he didn’t do those, so he resigned.  
They practice blocking, serving, spiking, all of those abilities that would need to be improved if they ever wished to play against seijoh for a rematch, after some complaining of Tsukishima’s part, Yamaguchi convinced him to try to block his floating serve, just as before, the floating serve didn’t reach the net, or it hit it, or if it ever passed, it was easily blocked by Tsukishima, even if Yamaguchi tried to be more careful measuring how much power he needed to use, he either used to little, or way to much, in one point, Yamaguchi hit the ball with almost the same force as before in the incident with Nishinoya, as he felt the ball leaving his hand at an extreme speed, he freaked out, luckily, Tsukishima blocked that ball without problem, Yamaguchi sighted with relief, he maybe used way to much force for that serve, but Tsukki could withstand anything, he was in a way his shield in the worst moments hunting witches of course he would withstand such a blow, another thing to the list of why Tsukki was so cool.

The practice passed with out much noise, everyone did what they were supposed to do, everything was so silent, something weird for the Karasuno team, someone was missing, and it wasn’t only nishinoya.  
“Has anyone seen Tanaka?” Daichi asked the members of the team, Tanaka’s explosive personality was an usual asset of Karasuno, so without him around, everything felt off. “he said he was going to look for Asahi.. but he should have been here by now.” Suga replied, with a worried expression on his face, everyone was beginning to feel concerned regarding Tanaka’s whereabouts, Yamaguchi was already imagining thousand of scenarios happening regarding Tanaka. “ maybe something happened to him.” He said.  
“I don’t think so.” Replied the captain, even if he said it with a confident tone, it was still obvious that he was concerned. “what could happen to him inside the training camp, but it’s still off, that without including that Asahi is also missing.” His confidence dropped, a heavy atmosphere began to fill the place, even Tsukishima was silent, he wondered about his teammate’s location too, and when he felt the gym’s atmosphere change so suddenly, he began to develop a bad feeling about the whole. “it can’t be-“  
His thoughts were interrupted when Tsukishima’s and Yamagushi’s rings glowed, they had detected a strong presence of magic somewhere in the camp, that could only mean one thing.

“A witch.” Yamaguchi said, maybe the worst case scenario was really going to happen. “witch?” suga asked, what was his teammate talking about? Tsukki stepped in as he placed his hands over Yamaguchi’s mouth. “sorry, we have something important to do.” Daichi tried to stop them, oblivious of what was really going on. “wait a moment!!!  
Where are you going?” but they had already left the gym again, Daichi didn’t know what to feel, why was everyone suddenly disappearing. “I’ll go talk with the coach.” Sugawara said, trying to calm his friend down.  
\----------‐------------------------------------  
The two magical boys rushed through the gym’s doors, trying to find where the magic came from, Tsukki seemed more altered than usual, regarding witches of course. “you moron!!.” He said, reprimanding Yamaguchi. “don’t talk about witches in front of the others!!!” Yamaguchi was scared for what could happen, to what happened with his teammates, they were captured by a witch? “Sorry Tsukki.. I was nervous, I won’t do that again!!!” the shorter one said. “but you seemed nervous too… way more than usual” Tsukishima looked down, he kind of felt guilty for what was happening. “this witch’s magic…” he said, as he summoned his soul gem to try to locate it quicker. “is of the same witch I fought earlier.”  
Yamaguchi felt a shiver down his spine, a witch really came to the camp to spread curses around, if Tsukishima couldn’t hunt it down, how strong could it be.  
They finally reached the hallway where the dorms were located, the air felt heavy and cold, and there wasn’t enough light to see clearly, but between the darkness, Yamaguchi could tell that someone was in the ground, someone similar to… “Tanaka-san!!” Yamaguchi said, as he rushed towards Tanaka’s body, luckily, he was still breathing, we has just unconscious. “how could this happen?” Yamaguchi questioned, as he checked if Tanaka had any serious injuries.  
“I think that your answer is there.” Tsukishima pointed at a door that was slightly open, high amounts of magic emanated from that place. “my soul gem’s reacting to it, the witch is there.” The two boys slowly opened the door, and when they entered, Yamaguchi almost screamed, Asahi was standing inside the room, stepping into the entrance of the witch’s barrier, Tsukishima quickly responded, rushing towards Asahi and knocking him out using magic, making him collapse, the entrance to the barrier closed immediately. Yamaguchi catched Asahi before he hit the floor. “you didn’t had to knock him out!!!” he yelled at Tsukishima. “ It was the easiest way to stop him from entering that barrier.” Tsukishima replied, as he pointed with his finger towards Asahi’s neck, he was still breathing too, but he had a weird mark in his neck, similar to a tattoo, Yamaguchi’s eyes widely opened as he noticed it. “he was kissed by a witch…” Yamaguchi quietly said, this was bad, a witch’s curse could have devastating effects on anyone, if they wanted to save him, they had to kill the witch.  
Yamaguchi left Asahi’s body leaning in a wall and stood up, preparing for the fight they were going to face. “we have no time to lose now.” Tsukishima said, as he put his hand on the wall that used to be the enter to the witches barrier, and using a bit of his magic, he reopened the entrance, and he then proceeded to transform into his fighting clothes, summoning a shield as his weapon. “we are going to clean this one quick, do you still have your grief seed?

” Yamaguchi remembered that he had already used his grief seed earlier, now they only had one, if the witch was really powerful, they would be in trouble, he didn’t know how to respond, Tsukishima glanced at him, and chuckled. “,why such a terrified face?” he asked, mocking Yamaguchi’s current mood. “we still have one grief seed, and this witch isn’t that strong, if we defeat it quickly, it won’t cause much damage.”  
That statement motivated yamaguchi, maybe things wouldn’t be so bad, and if they were, he still had to defend his team from this monster, it was his duty. “I’m fine now.” He said as he took a deep breath and transformed into his fighting clothes too, summoning a spear as his weapon, “I’m ready, let’s not hold back!!”  
Tsukki nodded. “good.” The two boys jumped inside the witch’s barrier.

As they stepped into the entrance, as they entered the witch’s barrier, the world around them changed drastically, the landscape transformed to an open field, with large webs coming put of the ground, and the sky was filled with what seemed to gears and parts of some sort of device, the whole scenario had resemblance to a cubist style picture, fitting for a witch’s distorted world, the two finally landed in an empty spot of the barrier. “here we are…” Yamaguchi said, as he looked around, he felt his heart speeding up, all his body preparing for a battle, in the distance, he could tell that some entities were getting near, as the fog disappeared, the forms of them became more visible, the entities seemed to look like puppets, pulled by strings that came from above, “familiars…” Tsukishima said, they were entities created by the main witch to protect itself. “Prepare yourself!!! They are coming”.  
the puppet like entities swarmed around those two, as they grew morbid horns from their heads, and some of them charged at a great speed against Yamaguchi, who was paralyzed by fear, even if he had done this a couple of times, he still couldn’t get used to it, luckily, Tsukishima stepped between them and blocked the familiar’s horns with his shield. “stop freezing up like that!!! You are gonna get us killed by day’s end.” Yamaguchi felt guilty, he wasn’t that powerful, not with volleyball, not with magic. “sorry Tsukii..” Tsukishima charged back using the shield to throw the familiar away, but that wasn’t the only familiar, many other came from behind, blasting fragments of wood from their hands, but the two magical boys jumped from where they were and dodged the blasts, Yamaguchi took a deep breath, they would never win if they kept dodging, so he summoned his spear once again and charged against a nearby familiar, he took a big jump, and landed on top of the minion, stabbing it to the core, he kept applying force, until the familiar split in two, Yamaguchi grinned. “I did it!! I killed one!!” but Tsukishima wasn’t impressed at all, he just kept charging at the familiars, smashing them against the walls with his shield, Yamaguchi’s smile disappeared when the familiar he had just killed stood up again, or to be more specific, the two familiars stood up, “my attacks have no effect…” he thought.

the minions proceeded to chase Yamaguchi across the halls, he kept slashing them and throwing spears at them, but it had no use, when cut, they kept multiplying. “this is bad Tsukki!!!” Tsukishima didn’t had it easy neither, the familiars he had just killed stood cup once again. “damn it.” He softly said, this would be more complicated, maybe the witch fed on some humans before coming here. Yamaguchi fell to the ground, he was getting exhausted, using way too much magic was affecting him, he looked to the ceiling, seeing the string that moved the puppet-like familiars around. “Strings.” He thought, and the he had an idea, he stood up, and charged at a familiar, but this time, he targeted the strings first, he stabbed the familiar’s main body to distract it, and took impulse to cut the cords in seconds, the familiar collapsed. “if we cut their strings, they won’t move anymore!!!” Yamaguchi said, as he gained more confidence.  
Tsukishima quickly picked up on what had to be done. “maybe this won’t be so bad.” he smirked, as he took two blades shaped like boomerangs from his belt, and threw them in the air, slicing dozens of strings around the hall, as dozens of familiars collapsed. “it’s working!!!” Yamaguchi cheered, as he summoned plenty of spears, and threw them slicing the leftover familiars, in a matter of minutes, the hall was clean, and a door revealed itself at the end. “ Good job.” Tsukishima said, as the two rushed to the door, Yamaguchi took another deep breath, and opened said door, transporting them to the next level of the witch’s barier.  
When the lights stop shining, they could see that they were in some sort of distorted, incomplete coliseum, with dozens of gates, and from them, thousands of familiars rushed in, this ones looked like foxes with 7 eyes in their bodies, and a whole set of teeth, Yamaguchi stopped moving again, he had never seen so many familiars, he had to stay behind Tsukii, as the horde of familiars broke in the coliseum, Tsukishima used part of his magic to increase the size of the shield, but it wasn’t enough, dozens of familiars crashed into the shield each minute? Making the two go back a few steps, and behind them, a wall was waiting for them, they didn’t had much ideas left, but something had to be done, familiars keep appearing and they couldn’t see, they needed a bigger shield. “Use your magic to copy my shield!!!” Tsukishima suggested, as part of his wish, Yamaguchi had the power to copy, from weapons, to powers, to appearances for a short period of time, Yamaguchi nodded, using his special magic burned out his soul gem quite quickly, but he had no choice. “let’s do it!!.” He said, as he touched Tsukishima’ back, his soul gem glowed with a blue hue mixed with red, as his spear changed shape, to become a shield, with this new shield in hand, Yamaguchi fused the two shields together, making a one that was bigger, and since he copied some of Tsukishima’s magic too, he gained more strength, the two grunted, as they took step by step forward, making their way through the horde of familiars, if they couldn’t kill them, they had to avoid them.

“I see a door!!!” Yamaguchi said, at the back, a door similar to the last one entered, but suddenly, the ground cracked open, and the two fell in it. Tsukishima had to catch Yamaguchi, who refused to open his eyes during the fall, Yamaguchi finally opened his eyes, to see that the door was now several feet away from them. “what do we do now?” he asked Yamaguchi, with a panicked tone, this barrier was just a big trap for both humans and magical boys.  
Tsukishima didn’t say anything, instead, he slammed his shield against the ground, and as he did, a flow of red magic emanated from it, Yamaguchi felt shivers from seeing his friend’s power, he was really a veteran. From the ground, dozens of shields emerged, and they began to float in the air, arranging themselves in a manner similar to a staircase, up to the exit. “if our path keeps being destroyed, we’ll just make a new one” Tsukishima said, as he put his feet in the new staircase, to proof it’s resistance, “that was cool Tsukki!!” Yamaguchi said, his friend really had a lot of tricks under the sleeve, the two began to climb the staircase, moving quickly to reach the door, it almost seemed like the two were having a competition to see who got to the door first, but some familiars steeped in and jumped, landing on the staircase, but that wouldn’t stop Tsukishima, as he used his shield to smack them and pushing them off the staircase, and Yamaguchi didn’t stop moving neither, as Tsukii took the lead, defending the front, he divided his spear in two halves, using them as knifes to slaughter the familiar that were threatening Tsuki’s back. But one of the familiars pushed Yamaguchi, making his hat fall from the staircase, but Tsukishima extended his hand and catch it before it fell, and as Yamaguchi finished up the familiar that had dared to push him, he put the hat in the green haired magical boy. “you shouldn’t drop this.” Tsukishima said. “thanks Tsukii.” Yamaguchi said, as he looked the door getting closer with a soft smile “I’ll take more care.

The two finally made it to the door, and both opened it at the same time, and as they did, they felt the witch’s magic flow strongly from inside, this was the final level, they both thought, this final barrier looked a lot like a shrine, a long hallway lead to a beautiful shrine, surrounded by spinning gears and old devices, the two stepped in and looked around, the place felt to big in comparison to the previous two, but it felt empty too, the witch wasn’t there. “I don’t get it.” Yamaguchi said, as he scratched his head. “the witch should be here…” but his statement was proven wrong when they both heard a loud roar, Tsukii looked up, seeing a giant skull descending From the ceiling of the barrier. “this is it..” two snakes came put of the skull’s eye sockets, as they scrolled between the different holes, that bizarre thing was a witch. Yamaguchi felt his stomach churn, it was a disgusting witch, just like all of them, where do this creatures come from? He thought, but it was no time for asking questions. “don’t space out, this is the final battle!!! Tsukishima said, as the snakes began to scroll towards them, Yamaguchi grabbed his spear, preparing to attack, he felt nervous, but it was his duty  
BRING IT ON!!!!

Schrein der Völlerei  
The shrine witch, it’s nature is that of a liar.  
This witch only believes in perfection, it passes it’s days looking at it’s perfect barrier, being witness of it’s familiars expanding the labyrinth with new layers each day, this witch also enjoys eating, it will eat any human that it’s familiars bring it as an offering, and if any familiars steps put of the line, it will eat the familiar too, just to keep everything in order, the witch has obsessed with perfection so much that it forgot it’s deepest desire in a past life, to find it’s missing identical half, this witch will negate to use it’s full power until necessary, or until provoked.


	2. Someone has to be cursed

Chapter 2:  
Someone must endure an equal ammount of despair.

The witch descended slowly, looming over the two boys, yamaguchi’s legs were shaking, now that the witch was this close, he could see that his size was non existent comparing it to that monster, he had an horrible feeling about the situation. “Yamaguchi!!! Focus!!.” Tsukishima said as he touched yamaguchi’s shoulders. “We don’t have time for this.”

  
“Yeah… sorry Tsukki…” he really hated it, why couldn’t he be better than this, if it wasn’t for Tsukki, he would have probably been killed by now, but he had no time to think about that, since the witch landed with a loud screech, and one of the snakes that came out of the witch’s eye sockets got lose, and approached the two boys with an inhuman speed, the two only managed to dodge that attack by seconds, now they had two targets, the main witch, and that golden snake. “We can’t defeat two of them now!!! Yamaguchi complained, as he looked at tsukki with concerned eyes. “it can’t get worse right?” but they were once again interrupted when an horde of familiars popped out of the ground, they were pretty similar to the ones from before, long wooden fingers and sharp tooth, another problem to the list.

  
“We could retrieve if needed…”Tsukishima said, as he summoned his shield once again to protect himself, Yamaguchi thought for a moment, they could really leave the labyrinth, but if they did that, the witch would still end up cursing anyone inside the training camp, they had to kill the witch right here, right now. “not yet, we can’t go yet…” Yamaguchi said, as he split his spear in two halves. “I can take down the familiars.. while you fight with that” he pointed towards the big snake rushing towards them. “… fine.” Tsukki groaned, as both of them jumped out of the snakes’s reach.

  
Tsukishima rushed towards the snake, to catch it’s attention, and when he had achieved that, he began to run in the opposite direction to keep the giant monster away from Yamaguchi,   
Yamaguchi was meanwhile swarmed by the witch’s familiars, even if he took a defensive position, they took him down easily, he tried to use his spear to block their attacks, but it wasn’t working, he had to think of something to defend himself, and he did, when the familiars where about to dig their teeth in their arms, he managed to kick some of them down with his free leg, and as many of them got up again, he quickly grabbed his spear, and divided it in a lot of little pieces, and began to throw them away, in a similar way of what Tsukki did earlier, cutting the strings that were controlling the familiars. “I have to hurry!!” he thought, as he summoned a new spear, ready to take down the remaining familiars.

  
Meanwhile Tsukki was still running away from the monstrous snake, but he found himself trapped between the snake and a nearby wall, letting the snake an easy chance of eating him, but as the giant monster was about to bite the boy, he used his shield to keep the snake’s jaws wide open, when he did that, the snake began to shake, trying to liberate it’s jaws. “I need to end this now.” He thought, he really hated fighting this witches, if it wasn’t for the grief seeds, he would have no need to fight them, his reason to fight had long been gone, so he just wanted to end it quickly.

  
He took from his belt an old grenade, since his main “weapon” only had defensive purposes, he had to use other magic elements to make harm to the witches, he activated the grenade, and when he had the chance, he threw the grenade inside the snake’s mouth, but it would take some time to explode, as he kept struggling, he saw that in the distance, Yamaguchi still had problems with the familiars, and he thought of an idea to take both down.

  
“YAMAGUCHI!!!” he screamed, catching the other teenager’s attention. “ come over here!!” Yamaguchi wasn’t sure of what Tsukii was planning to do, but he trusted him, he had more experience of course, so he got up, and began to run to where Tsukishima was, and the familiars chased after him, he prayed that Tsukki really had some kind of plan.

  
When he got to where Tsukishima was, the blonde made a sign with his hand, indicating that he had to go behind the shield with him, Yamaguchi nodded, as he took a place next to Tsukishima behind the shield, the other familiars reached the two and began to bite the shield, but Tsukishima used some of his magic to make the shield stronger, but with the constant scratching and biting, they didn’t know for how long it would. “What are you planning Tsukki!!!??”

Yamaguchi asked, he was getting really stressed with their situation, what if the shield collapsed?. Tsukishima just looked as the snake struggled to take the shield out of it’s mouth.

  
“3”  
“Tsukki?”  
“2”  
“wh-why are you counting?”  
“1”  
“TSUKIII!!!”

  
The grenade activated, and exploded with a red light, making all the barrier shake, and incinerating the snake and the remaining familiars. As the smoke cleared, Yamaguchi sighted, they survived for now…  
“Thank you Tsukki!!”  
“Whatever… he still gotta kill the witch.”

  
“Shit” Yamaguchi said under his breath, the giant snake that Tsukki had just killed was just a part of the witch’s main body, but once again his thoughts met and end when a wave of acid rained upon then, but luckily, Tsukki’s shield, that survived the explosion with no mayor damage, protected them from the witch’s acid, the monstrous being levitated over them, the other snake coming out of it’s eye sockets was releasing the poison from it’s fangs.

“now we have to think of how to destroy that thing” Tsukishima said, as he looked up to the witch that was several times their size.

  
“Maybe I can use my final move…” Yamaguchi suggested, with a little doubt in his voice. “your what?” Tsukishima asked, what was Yamaguchi talking about?. “well, I’ve been working on a technique to finish off a witch more quick, but, it uses a lot of magic, and I have never tried it in a witch before…” Tsukishima wasn’t sure, could he really do it? “I don’t think you should…” “I can do it” Yamaguchi said with confidence, Tsukki was always saving his ass, so why couldn’t he do the same? “I just need your stamina magic..” that was Tsukishima’s special magic, he could maximize his power and resistance for a short moment of time, and he could maximize other’s abilities too, he thought, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, he proceeded to place his hand in Yamaguchi’s shoulder, transferring some of his magic. “Fine, Just don’t get us killed off” Yamauchi chuckled, he can really do this. “Don’t worry, once I’m done we can practice volleyball the rest of the day”   
“shut off.”

  
Yamaguchi felt his body warmed up by Tsukki’s magic, he really felt stronger, and more capable of doing what he needed, “here I go” he said as he gave a massive jump, he felt that he was flying, everything looked so small from there, even the witch, but he had no time to lose, he summoned hundreds of spears around him, and as gravity began to act again, all of them fell at once, the witch prepared to attack using the snake’s head that it had left, but the falling spears stabbed the snake’s body, destroying that part of the witch, other spears stabbed the witch’s body and they fixed it to the ground, the witch was finally unable to move.

  
As he was falling, Yamaguchi took a deep breath, he could do this, Tsukishima was counting on him, he summoned a single spear, and with his magic, he made it several times it’s original size, it has heavy and difficult to control, but with Tsukki’s magic, he could easily control the spear, Yamaguchi grabbed the spear and he began to charge it with more of his magic, this was his final move, a few seconds later, he was about to collide with the witch.

  
“pioggia di stelle!!!”

  
He yelled, as the tip of the giant spear crushed the witch’s skull, causing a great explosions, debris were flying everywhere, Tsukishima was impressed, his friend really managed to finish off a witch that quickly. “cool…” he thought to himself.

  
Yamaguchi gracefully landed near Tsukki and rushed towards him, that was the most amazing thing he did in a log time, he didn’t believe what he had done. “Tsukkiiiii!!” he yelled, as he jumped in Tsukishima’s arms, almost making both loss balance, Tsukishima hadn’t seen Yamaguchi so happy for a long time, maybe today wouldn’t be so bad.

“I did good right!!??” Tsukishima’s usual straight face got replaced with a soft smile, now that Yamaguchi defeated the witch, the labyrinth would collapse, and they would get the witch’s grief seed as a reward.  
They waited  
They waited

They waited.  
“…this is weird.” Yamaguchi pointed out, even if the witch had been killed, the barrier was still intact, Tsukishima looked worried, this had never happened before, the witch is dead, so they should be free. “something isn’t right.” The witch couldn’t have survived that final attack. 

  
Right?

  
A metallic sound came from behind their back, and when they turned around, they saw that from the witch’s remains, a yellow smoke was escaping to the air. ”what the h-“ Yamaguchi couldn’t finish his sentence as the ground began to shake, all the barrier began to shake, Yamaguchi almost lost his balance, but Tsukishima grabbed him before he could fall, and finally, an enormous explosion blinded them both from the amount of light, when Tsukishima could open his eyes again, he saw something horrible, he could see that the witch was alive, and it was bigger than before, the human skull from before had grown into a fox’s skull, with horns in the sides, that skull sitting in some kind of complicated dress, that had connected two long arms that resembled the two original snake parts of the witch, and it was a lot of times bigger, letting out a growl that could be heard from all the barrier.

  
Yamaguchi’s eyes were wide open, why was the witch still alive? He used a lot of magic to make sure of eliminating it, but all that work had no use. “I don’t understand!!!” he felt really nervous now, could that witch end up killing them both?, dying in a barrier meant never finding a body, so thinking of that possibility sent shivers down his body.

  
Tsukishima by the other hand kept looking at the witch’s “upgrade” he wasn’t sure of what happened, but he had a theory. “I think that what we killed was a shell..” “What do you mean Tsukki?” Yamaguchi asked, as he looked up to the monster that lied before them, could they really defeat it? “maybe the witch that we killed was only a decoy.” Tsukishima continued. “maybe it was fooling us using a little fraction of it’s real power, but once it felt a real threat, it evolved to it’s full form.” He felt a tight sensation in his heart, he felt that this witch would be complicated to deal with.

  
“But nonetheless.. we have to defeat it!!” Yamaguchi exclaimed, he was scared of course, but he had a duty to complete, he would even die if it meant protecting those he cared about, but his thoughts were interrupted when purple flames emanated from the witch’s mouth, the two magical boys luckily dodged the attack. “We have to think of something quick!!!” Yamaguchi said, as he summoned his spear once again, but Kei quickly grabbed his arm, making him jump “Tsukki! Wh-,what happene-“ but he was interrupted once again when the witch summoned hundreds of arms armed with sewing needles, ready to stab them to death, as the needles feel to the ground, Tsukishima pulled Yamaguchi’s hand, trying to dodge the deadly rain, but even if they tried to dodge them, one of the giant needles scrapped Yamaguchi’s arm, making him fall to the ground.

“Yamaguchi!!!” Tsukishima said, the wound was quite big, but since they were magical boys, it wasn’t that bad, but for a moment he imagined what would have happened if the needle shattered Yamaguchi’s soul gem.

  
He quickly grabbed the green haired boy and began to run as fast as he could, they had to get out of here, he didn’t even had time to attack, but Yamaguchi stopped running. “we can’t leave yet!!!” he said, as he grabbed his broken arm, using some of his magic to cure it. Tsukishima looked worried about something. “I still can try to use my attack from earlier, but this time I can concentrate all the force on one single point…maybe it will work right?” Yamaguchi said, he wasn’t even sure if it was true, but he had to believe, Tsukishima by the other hand wasn’t convinced.

“but…don’t use too much magic, we only have one grief seed left…” he said, as he summoned his shield, and stood in front of Yamaguchi. “If you keep using magic, your soul gem will get more tainted..”  
“ but nothing really big happens after that right?” that question made the blonde guy shut his mouth, he just couldn’t tell him, not in a moment like this. “Tsukki? Are you ok?” Yamaguchi asked, today Tsukishima had been acting way too weird. “yeah…” Tsukishima replied. “I was spacing out, lets do it.”

  
“Yeah!”

  
Tsukishima began to run against the powerful witch, using his shield to protect the two of them from the rain of needles, but suddenly, one of the witch’ arms fell from the sky, crashing against the ground, just above the two, but Tsukishima used some of his personal magic to give him extra strength to stand against the pressure, but he was beginning to feel tired, maybe he was using way too much magic too, but it was no time for that. “Yamaguchi!!! Now!!”   
“Ok-“ Yamaguchi said as he took a big jump once again, in mid air he didn’t summoned many spears, he took most of his magic and materialized it in one massive spear, it was to heavy, but he didn’t mind, as the gravity pulled him to the ground, he was preparing to target what he thought it was the witch’s weak point, a gem that connected the witch’s head with the body, he prepared to use way much more magic than before.

  
“pioggia di stelle” he yelled once again, but before he did damage to the witch, a needle pierced the spear, cutting it in two pieces, Yamaguchi gasped, his final attack was useless now, and so the witch used it’s snake-like arm to throw Yamaguchi away.

“Yamaguchi!!!” Tsukishima screamed, as he ran towards the place Yamaguchi would fall, trying to open up his arms to save him, and he did, Yamaguchi fell in his arms, avoiding the impact, they both sighted from relief. “I’m sorry…” Yamaguchi said, we was really that weak? Or maybe that witch was way too powerful for them. “No times for apologies now, we need a way to cut through the witch’s defenses.” Tsukishima said, as he tried to analyze the situation.

“cut…” Yamaguchi tought, all witches had a special ability, perhaps this witch’s ability was to cut down anything in it’s path, that needle broke his spear like nothing, so… “I can copy the witch’s magic…”  
“What are you-“ Tsukishima asked, he wasn’t trying to. “but you have never copied a witch’s magic, we don’t know what would happen” “but If I do it, we might be able to kill the witch with it’s own power.”

Yamaguchi claimed, as he grabbed his spear and charged towards the witch, Tsukishima tried to stop the green haired boy, but he was already in close contact with the witch, “don’t do that moron!!!” But Yamaguchi wasn’t listening to him anymore, he dodged the witch’s needles, and for a second, he managed to touch the witch’s dress, copying the witch magic, he suddenly felt a lot of malice inside of him, “a witch’s curse” he thought, his heart speeded up, he had to use this new power quickly, he managed to dodge one of the needles quite easily, and as another one of those was about to stab his back, he turned around and swing his spear, making a clean cut to the needle, making it explode, this power wasn’t that bad to use after all, Tsukishima was about to tell him to stop, but a horde of familiars showed up again, forcing Tsukishima to block their attacks, Yamaguchi took a deep breath, and jumped to avoid the needles once again, and as he fell, he began to gracefully cut each needle in half, drastically reducing their number, but he was oblivious that his soul gem was getting darker at a higher speed than before, suddenly the witch’s arm descended quickly, almost crushing Yamaguchi, but he dodged the giant arm once again, and as before, but with even more force, he jumped as high as he could, several feet into the air, he could see from here the whole barrier, and he could also see the witch’s snake-like arm getting nearer.  
  


  
But he knew what to do, he charged his spear with the witch’s magic, and prepared his attack, as he landed in the snake’s head, he stabbed it with all his force, making the snake arm slowly crumble down, making Yamaguchi fall, but this time he Managed to land on his two feet, meanwhile Tsukishima finished to knock down the familiars that were surrounding him, and rushed towards Yamaguchi, “ did you see that Tsukki?” Yamaguchi asked excited, but Tsukishima’s expression didn’t match his.

“not really… but you should stop, look.” He pointed towards Yamaguchi’s soul gem, the bright blue from before was replaced by a familiar dark purple. “you soul gem is getting burned up way to quick.” But Yamaguchi didn’t listen, he finally had the chance to kill a witch with this power. “I can’t stop now-“ he said as he jumped once again, charging against the witch, beginning to cut the needles one by one, and dodging the fire that the witch threw from it’s mouth.

  
Tsukishima watched from the ground, something was off, Yamaguchi’s soul gem had blackened way to quick , this wasn’t good, he then made the connection. “YOU HAVE TO STOP YAMAGUCHI!!” kei screamed at the top of his lungs. “since you copied the witch’s curse magic, your soul gem is taking in the witch’s curses as well!!!” but Yamaguchi didn’t listen, or rather, he didn’t want to listen, he was finally doing fine, he could finally beat a witch, he wasn’t weak anymore. “if you don’t stop, you’ll become a-“ he was gonna say something else, but the witch used it’s remaining hand again to try and kill Yamaguchi.

  
but he was getting ready, he took a deep breath, but when he was going to stab the witch, he felt a really deep pain in his chest, a sudden, radiating pain, he wanted to scream, but nothing came out, he lost the momentum, and began to fall, leaving the witch a chance to hit Yamaguchi once again, sending him several feet away.

“you moron!!” Tsukishima tried to appear angry, but his face was of mayor concern, when Yamaguchi hit the ground, he lost his magical outfit, turning back to his gym clothes, his lungs burned, he felt that he couldn’t breath, his heart was beating way to quick, he began to panic, what was happening to him? He suddenly lost his power, he opened his hand, and what he saw froze his sight, his soul gem was pitch black, it was completely full of impurities, he had no more magic left, he began to feel cold, and colder, his visions started to drift away too, along with his consciousness, the last sense he lost was his hearing, only noticing someone calling for him, he tried to say something, but his vocal cords nor his body would respond

  
“Am I dying” he thought, as his heart stopped beating altogether.

\----‐--------------------------------------------------

It was dark, Yamaguchi tried to open his eyes, but he couldn’t, his body was no longer responding, even if his eyes weren’t open, he was somehow able to see, he was no longer in the witch’s barrier, he seemed to be in the barrier of another witch, the place looked like an empty, infinite hall without roof, letting the big dark sky be seen, the moon on top of it, he just laid there, his soul gem was completely tainted with malice, “someone..” he tried to say, but no words would come out, he was trapped somewhere, a place that grew colder and darker, he wanted to cry, he wanted to run, he wanted to scream, but he couldn’t do anything, as always.

  
“Why is he so wimpy?” Yamaguchi heard a voice, he couldn’t locate where it came from, it felt cold, but oddly familiar

  
“So funny, he can’t do anything on it’s own” 

  
Yamaguchi wanted the voice to stop, he knew it already, he was useless, but he didn’t need someone to acknowledge that.

  
“He just keeps using Tsukishima as a shield doesn’t he?”

  
“He has no will for himself, he’ll just follow whoever shows him a little compassion .”

  
“So pathetic”

  
“Stop!!”

  
“He just doomed Tsukishima Kei to an unavoidable death”

  
“That’s not true!!!” he wanted to say, but deep down, he knew it was true.

  
“He is useless, no one can stand his tantrums.”

  
He felt the ground shacking, the soft lights of the infinite hall turned off, revealing millions of constellations in the sky, and from the ground, an entity came out, it looked like some type of clock, with a giant eye in it’s center, with four arms emerging from behind it, holding a species of dress that contained an empty ribcage, a witch.

The monster quickly stretched it’s hand towards Yamaguchi, trapping him and crushing him, he could feel his bones breaking, all his body being torn apart, but he couldn’t scream

  
“his wish will never come true”

  
“He could have wished to help someone in a worse state than what he is”

  
“He could help those who worked harder than him.”

  
“He’s so selfish”

  
“Why is he alive?”

  
The voice that kept ringing in his ears, that annoying voice, the voice that came from the witch standing in front of him, it was his voice.

  
“please…make it stop.” He managed to say. But suddenly, he felt something warm, a more peaceful sensation, it felt like if all those negative thoughts he had drifted away, and he felt that his heart started to beat again, he slowly opened his eyes, he saw that someone was near him, but it wasn’t that witch from before, it was Tsukki, he looked mainly angry with Yamguchi about something, but the green hair boy could also read some worry in the blond’s expressions, he then realized that Tsukishima was using their last grief seed on him, his soul gem was no longer dark, but he felt guilty, his mindless attacks from earlier drained all his magic, but now, they had no grief seeds at all, maybe what he saw earlier was an illusion from the curses inside of him

  
“I’m sorr-“

  
“YOU DUMBASS!!! Why do you keep throwing yourself to danger like this!!!” Tsukishima grabbed yamaguchi’s shirt firmly, shacking him. “ THERE’S NO POINT!!! This witch is way too powerful for us!, why can’t you understand that?”

  
Yamaguchi felt angry at his friend, why did Tsukishima gave up so easily?. “WHAT ELSE ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO? IT’S OUR DUTY TO KILL THE WITCH!!”

  
“we can just escape and search for another witch later..”

  
He was only fighting to get more grief seeds, Yamaguchi wondered, all this time Tsukishima only fought for a prize? “AND LET EVERYONE AT THE CAMP DIE?? How can you be ok with that?

  
“We can’t do anything, no matter what we do, the witch is way stronger, we’ll only get killed alongside the others…”

  
Yamaguchi’s blood boiled, he was tired of feeling miserable, he was tired of seeing his friend giving up so easily, he couldn’t deal with any of this anymore.   
“AT LEAST TRY TO FIGHT FOR YOUR OWN FUCKING WISH!!!”

  
Tsukishima’s eyes widened, he had never seen Yamaguchi like this before, but his anger was pointless. “my wish has no meaning now… and if we keep on fighting this monster, if our soul gems turn completely dark, we will-“

  
“WE WILL WHAT?

  
Tsukishima didn’t answer, he didn’t had time for this, this battle had already been lost, he would have to retrieve now. “do as you wish, if you really wanna get killed off that easily, I won’t stop you…” he began to walk away, searching for an exit to the labyrinth.   
“Tsukki…” Yamaguchi said, maybe they had gone too far, but as he thought that, the witch began to glow, and a beam of energy came from it’s mouth, in Tsukishima’s direction, but he managed to block the beam with the shield, but Yamaguchi could see that Tsukishima didn’t had enough energy to hold it.

“Tsukki!!!” Yamaguchi yelled as he rushed towards tsukishima, transforming again into his magical outfit and used all of his forces to keep the shield from moving, the heat was way to strong for them, and the shield was beginning to melt, Tsukishima’s expression looked empty, as if he knew that he was going to die, but Yamaguchi wouldn’t let that happen.  
“Tsukki, I always looked up to you, since that day you saved me from those bullies, I always admired your strength, your intelligence, your everything.”

Tsukishima’s feet were being thrown back from the force of the beam. “I even did my contract to be someone as strong as you!!” Ymaguchi felt that he needed to let it all out, he didn’t want to believe it, but somehow it felt like this would be their last chance to talk. “but seeing you giving up so easily makes me hurt… I can’t stand watching you give up when the first problem shows up, so please, at least for today, DON’T GIVE UP!!! Let me protect you!!! We can do this together.”

  
Tsukishima felt horrible, seeing that his friend was giving out his best to protect them, since when did he lost his will to fight? Why was he so unmotivated, he suddenly remembered, he recalled the day that his wish no longer made sense, the day he lost his reason to be a magical boy.

\----------------------------------------------------------------

The crowd cheered for the two teams, Karasuno and Shiratorizawa, it was the final game, to decide which team would be able to represent the prefecture in the spring tournament, Tsukishima was part of the audience, he had also brought Yamaguchi with him, he felt really excited, his wish had really come true, Tsukishima Akiteru managed to be the wing spiker, or better known as the ace, the number 4 of Karasuno, and a regular.

“your brother is really lucky!!” Yamaguchi said, he was kind of jealous for not being able to play, but maybe when he entered highschool. “I’m not saying he is bad, but him being the ace so suddenly feels like a miracle.” Tsukishima nodded, it was indeed a miracle, he now had to fight witches, it was scary, but seeing his brother happy was enough for him, “ hey brother!! Right here!!” Kei waved his hands to call out his brother’s attention, Akiteru looked at kei and gave him a soft smile, but somehow, it felt like Akiteru was being bothered by something, he seemed happy most of the times, but when he played in the court, that smile felt rather fake, kei thought that the sudden pressure of being an ace was affecting him, so the only thing he could do was to cheer for him, and protecting him from witches too.

  
The two teams shook hands, and the whistle indicated the start of the match, Tsukishima made sure to keep an eye specially on his brother, karasuno started out pretty strong, their serves and blocking abilities were in pair with the shiratorizawa, the minutes went by, both teams kept making points against eachtother, until the karasuno took the set point, the crowd kept cheering on karasuno, Kei felt proud of his brother, he was playing really good, after all the training he did with coach Ukai, “he only needed a little chance to play” he thought, he felt blessed after meeting kyubbey, now his brother could finally go to nationals, for his last high school year.  
but Akiteru looked insecure about something, when the crowd began to cheer more on karasuno’s side, he began to space out, his serves were less strong than before, and he began to miss the blocking, the other members of the team were also growing tired each minute, so this new opening was used by shiratorizawa, taking the lead, and winning the second set by 25-13.

“is your brother alright? He is not focusing on the ball…” Yamaguchi said, the level of Karasuno suddenly drooped, but Kei had to stay positive. “each one has 1 set, the third one will decide, they haven’t lost yet…”

  
The third set began, karasuno’s members were playing with all their power once again, everyone except akiteru, as the time went by, his reaction time grew slower, his smile was no longer visible, it seemed that he didn’t want to be here, something that shocked Kei, there was something really bad. Finally the score was at 24-23, at shiratorizawa’s favor, the crowd began to cheer the purple team, but Kei would always cheer for his brother, this final minute would define who would go to nationals, the ball began to fly over the two teams, this final point was taking to long, Akiteru almost failed to catch the ball at one point, finally the ball was at shiratorizawa’s side, a wing spiker of them prepared to serve the ball, but karasuno’s middle blockers were already setting up a wall to stop it, but in a change of course, the wing spiker of shiratorizawa didn’t do a normal spike, instead, he did a.

“feint…” kei said, the ball was falling to their court, towards the left, just were Akiteru was, but he had spaced out once again, looking at the other side of the net, when he noticed that the ball was only a few inches away from the ground, it was to late, he tried to save it, but he was too late, the ball finally stopped moving. 25-23 that was it.

  
The shiratorizawa team hugged each other and cheered, they were going to the nationals once again, Kei was clueless, what happened to his brother? Akiteru just laid there, his teammates were devastated, some clenched their fists, some began to sob, but he just laid there in the ground, his mind was no longer in the game at all. “ you should talk to him.” Yamaguchi suggested, this had never happen before, something was wrong with akiteru. “I will…” Kei said, this would be a long night.

  
The teams shook hands again and headed back to their homes, Kei and Akiteru’s mom came to pick them out, after saying goodbye to yamaguchi, the two brothers entered the car, the ride back home was very silent, Kei tried to cheer up his brother, trying to bring up the good serves and saves he did on the match, but Akiteru seemed to be lost in his thoughts, only looking the road ahead them, their mother was silent too, so Kei decided to better talk with him later.  
When they parked, Akiteru grabbed his sports bag and entered the house, Kei following behind, their mother had to leave too attend am important reunion, leaving the two boys alone in the house.

Akiteru left the sports bag in the sofa and sit in one of the chairs on the living room, meanwhile kei sat in the sofa, they stayed silent for a few minutes, Akiteru just kept looking at his sports bag, with empty eyes, Kei didn’t know what to do, or what to say, so he decided to serve something for Akiteru.

“I’ll make some tea then” the young boy said, as he went to the kitchen to boil some water, when the tea was ready, he served it in two teacups and went back to the living room, Akiteru was still sitting in the chair, apparently he didn’t notice that Kei was in the room, so he just left the teacup in the table next to Akiteru, as he took some sips from the teacup, he looked at the clock, his brothers hasn’t said anything since the match ended, he had to say something.

  
“You still played a good match..” he had to do something, he didn’t want to see his brother like this, he tried to cheer him up. “remember when you and the number 10 were able to break Dateko’s iron wall?” Akiteru frowned and looked down. “or when you scored the last point against Seijoh? You needed some help from the others, but it was still amazing!!” Akiteru closed his eyes, Kei couldn’t tell if he was listening or not, but he kept talking.

  
“I mean… It’s really a shame that Karasuno didn’t make it to nationals, but this doesn’t have to be your last match.” Akiteru clenched his fists, trying to keep himself together, but still in silence. “maybe when you enter university, you can still play for a team….”

  
“Maybe you can still be an ace…”

  
“I’M NOT SUPPOSED TO BE AN ACE!!!”

Akiteru snapped, hitting the table with all his force, making the teacup fall off the table, breaking in a lot of shards. “I WAS NOT GOOD ENOUGH FOR THEM!!!! NOT ENOUGH!!!” he got up and hit the table once again, Kei was frozen, he didn’t know what to do, he could just stand there. “THIS IS MY FAULT!!!” Akiteru was shacking, in his breakdown, he almost flip the table over, he didn’t want to feel like this, he could just let all those feelings out. “I’M NOT GOOD AT ALL!!!”

  
“AKITERU!!!” Kei yelled, making akiteru stop, seeing his brother’s eyes filled with fear made the oldest brother stop his rampage. “please calm down.” What was he doing? He just kept hurting his brother, first by lying to him all those years, and now he failed him again, he was such an horrible brother.

“I’m-I’m sorry” Akiteru’s voice cracked, he fell to ground and began to sob, he just kept ruining everything, he couldn’t do anything right, Kei rushed to him and tried to comfort him by patting his back, tears kept flowing as Akiteru gasped for air trying to speak. “please, brother, what is going on?” Kei asked, trying to understand why was his brother so upset.

  
“I- I just am not good enough.” Akiteru tried to talk between his sobs, as Kei hugged him. “I don’t have the skills to be the ace..I’m not good enough, we lost because of me!!.” He was about to start crying again. “ that’s not true… the coach still picked you up to be an ace, he must have seen potential in you, I SEE potential in you.” Kei thought that maybe his wish influenced the coach to pick Akiteru to be the ace, he felt kind of guilty about that, but it didn’t matter now.  
But… I wasn’t supposed to be picked up.

if it wasn’t for the accident…”

  
Kei’s heart skipped a beat, what accident? “ what are you talking about?” Kei said, but Akiteru didn’t respond. “Answer me Akiteru!!” the oldest brother took a deep breath, he didn’t want his brother to know why was he the ace of karasuno, but Kei really wanted to know.

  
“It all happened the day after you…found out that I wasn’t a regular.” Akiteru began to explain, that was the same day that Kei did his contract with kyubbey, the younger brother began to think the worse. “we were practicing in the gym to prepare for the next matches, our old ace was also preparing for the matches, I didn’t get to do much at practice, so most of the time I watched, and that’s when it happened.” Kei’s heart began to beat faster, he began to connect the dots of what happened that day.

  
“They were practicing to do blockings, but when our ace and to other players jumped, he suddenly fell to the ground, he was rolling In the ground, grabbing his right ankle, we all rushed to him, we tried to get him up, but he couldn’t walk, so we took him to the hospital.” Akiteru remembered the fright he felt from seeing karasuno’s strongest player in the ground, contorting in pain. “in the hospitals they did some tests on him, and they found out that the nerves and ligaments in his legs suddenly snapped and were cut , there was no explanation to this, it was impossible for a fall to cause so much damage, the doctors said, there was no logical explanation to this kind of injury.”

Kei looked down, looking at his soul gem, “It can’t be…”

  
“He could no longer walk, and no surgery would be able to repair the damage, so he was confined to a wheelchair… naturally he would never be able to play volleyball again.” Tears were forming once again in Akiteru’s eyes, and Kei felt that he lacked air. “there’s no way I did this.” The younger one thought. “some days later, the coach called us to choose a new wing spiker, and from all the options… he picked me for some reason, I just don’t get what did he see on me.” Akiteru’s voice cracked again. “I couldn’t live up to our old ace’s abilities, they all counted on my, but I couldn’t deal with the pressure!” Kei felt that his heart shattered in a million pieces. “This is my fault…” Akiteru said, as he wiped some of his tears away.

  
Kei was shacking, no way, his wish didn’t hurt the original ace of karasuno, that’s not how it works… but that accident basically opened up the space for Akiteru to enter as the ace. “This isn’t your fault…” Kei said, as he grabbed a jacket and ran outside the house, leaving Akiteru behind. “wait!!! Kei!!! Don’t go…” he said as he stood up again, but his brother was gone.

Tsukishima ran, ran as fast as he could, he didn’t want to see his brother, or his mother, what had he done, he gritted his teeth, he had no proof that his wish indeed caused the ace to lose his ability to walk, but deep down he felt that he was guilty of this, but for confirmation, he had to talk with certain white fairy. He rushed to the park, he searched everywhere, almost running out of breath, until he found it, he found kyubbey resting in a park bench, apparently taking a nap, the white creature opened his red eyes, seeing a boy running towards him, “tsukishima kei, greetings, what do you need from me?” the white cat asked, but Kei didn’t stop, he grabbed the white fairy and threw it against a tree, he then grabbed the little creature once again, his eyes filled with hate.

  
“DID MY WISH REALLY BACKFIRED LKE THAT???” kyubbey didn’t understood why the boy was so angry with him, his wish had come true, why was he complaining then? “I don’t understand any of this. “ Kei applied more force to the fairy’s neck, but the cat had no mayor reaction. “ I know now, I know that Karasuno’s ace got injured the day after I did my contract… and that injury had no logical explanation… unless someone wished for it..” the fairy picked up on what Kei was saying. “ and when he could no longer play volleyball, they choose my brother instead to be the ace… this is how my wish came true? 

  
“You are right.” Kyubbey said, with no trace of guilt in it’s eyes, “for your brother to be the new “ace” something would need to happen to the old one to make space for him in the team.” So it was true, his wish really ended up cursing someone else, he just ruined someone’s life without knowing. “YOU DAMN CAT!!!! WHY COULDN’T YOU JUST TELL ME THAT THIS WOULD HAPPEN?”

  
“You never asked.” The white rat was right, he was so stupid, he was in such a miserable state that he never thought what would happen to the current ace of that time if he wished for a new ace to replace him, he was really that selfish. He wanted to cry, he couldn’t take it anymore.

  
“Why did this happen..why like this” his voice began to crack, as his eyes began to fill with tears. “I thought you knew it would happen.” The cat said peacefully in order for someone to be blessed with hope, someone else has to be cursed with an equal amount of despair to balance it to 0, that is too obvious.” Kei freed the white fairy from his grasp, and fell to his knees. “but I don’t control how wishes come true, there was always the risk of something like this to happen, but at the end you got what you wanted, right? The white cat stated, looking at the young boy in the ground.

  
“What hope are we talking about?.” Tears started to fall from his cheeks. “I ended up cursing my brother with guilt… when in reality, this is my fault.”  
He couldn’t hold it in anymore, he hit the ground with his fists, as his breath turned erratic. “MY WISH ONLY CAUSED EVERYONE DESPAIR!!!! EVEN FOR ME!!!” he began to sob, his lungs burned, he felt his mind warping inside his head, crying his heart out, as the white cat left the park, leaving the boy wailing alone in the dark.  
I’M a monster….


	3. It all balances to 0

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things aren't going well

It all balances to 0 

The two boys were facing a grave situation in the moment, the witch kept firing beams of energy against them, tsukishima’s shield was their only protection, and it wouldn’t last for long, as it began to break down with every impact, Yamaguchi was in a panic, this was probably the worst situation they had been, he tried to take deep breath as he tensed his whole body to keep the big shield in place, “tsukki!!!” Yamaguchi called out, looking at his friend, but something was weird, Tsukishima’s glare was blank, it seemed that he wasn’t responding to the situation, his breath was quick, as drips of sweat fell from his chin, he kept looking at the ground, slowly losing the grip of his shield, leaving more weight for Yamaguchi to carry on.

  
“Tsukii!!!, answer me!!!” he cried out, putting a hand on tsukki’s shoulder, but the blonde one didn’t respond, in fact, when Tadashi looked at his friend’s soul gem, the red jewel was beginning to contaminate at an alarming rate, only a very strong emotion could contaminate a soul gem that quickly, and since they no longer had grief seeds, he thought of what could happen, but decided to ignore that,”tsukii!! Please answer” but no one answered, the witch prepared to fire another blast, and the shield wouldn’t withstand other attack, the green haired boy hated to escape, he wanted to show a strong side, but right now he had no option, he quickly grabbed Tsukishima’s arm, and ran as fast as he could, dragging Tsukishima along, using extra magic to enhance his legs, leaving the shield behind, seconds before the witch fired it’s attack, disintegrating it to nothing, Yamaguchi tried to look between all the dust, until he found a big rock where they could hide behind for some time, they both reached the rock and hid behind, Yamaguchi sat down, Tsukishima sat down too, but it seemed to be more of a reflex rather than a conscious thought, the freckled boy took a big breath, and took a look at the witch, apparently the witch couldn’t find them now, but this wouldn’t last for long.

  
“that was a near one…” Yamaguchi muttered, trying not to think of what had just happened, he also expected Tsuki to answer something like “whatever” or “maybe if you had done this or that…” or any other sassy comment of his, but nothing came out of Tsukishima’s mouth, instead, he only took short and sharp breaths, and his eyes still didn’t seem to focus, not acknowledging what was happening around them, Yamaguchi was worried, maybe they had an argument some minutes ago, but something was different, he had never seen tsukki so altered, and to top it all, Tsukishima’s eyes began to water, his filter had finally broken, all his emotions that he kept locked somewhere surfaced, “Kei? Are you hurt??” Yamaguchi asked, as he tried to look if his friend had any injuries, but there was nothing wrong with his body, but apparently his mind was a different story, the blonde clenched his stomach, as he closed his eyes shut, his body had become increasingly stiff, only letting a weak word from his mouth.

  
“,I’m a monster…” he said between his teeth, Yamaguchi shivered at that line, what was going on inside Tsukishima’s head? He looked at Tsukishima’s pained expression, as he squeezed the blonde’s hand tightly, but there was no response, Yamaguchi only heard the screeching that came from behind, meaning that the witch was looking for them.  
“Kei…” Yamaguchi softly said, as he saw as a tear escaped Tsukishima’s eye.

  
“I- I am” Tsukishima muttered, before Yamaguchi extended his arms and hugged him, taking a firm grasp on him, he didn’t want to see Tsukki in pain, and also they had to do something to make it out alive, he could feel that Tsukishima’s breathing slowed down, and his body began to relax, Tsukishima felt warm, his memories had returned to hunt him and remind him of his sin, embraced in the cold, but he felt himself come back in his senses, he slowly opened his eyes, to see Yamaguchi giving him a reassuring smile. “does it feel better now?”  
“Yamaguchi….” Tsukishima said, as he catched his breath again, Yamaguchi brushed hand against Tsukishima’s soft cheeks, wiping out a tear.

Yamaguchi still couldn’t fully process what was happening right now, seeing Tsukishima like this was fairly new, but he knew that the blonde one isn’t the kind of guy to spill out what was he thinking of that moment, so the freckled boy could only wonder what happened, recalling the moments before Tsukishima began spiraling down.

  
He then remembered what he had said, angrily questioning Tsukishima about his reason to fight, and he also remembered that when asked about his wish earlier, Tsukishima frowned and looked away, maybe… “something happened with your wish?” Tadashi said, trying to sound as calm as possible, even if they were still trapped in the witch’s labyrinth, Tsukishima after recovering his train of thought, quickly realized about the situation, spacing out like this, looking at his soul gem, the bright red that it once was became tainted with a dark purple, and now with no grief seeds…. He wanted to leave this place, he knew that if they left, everyone in the team could be targeted by the witch, Daichi, Sugawara, Ennoshita, Nishinoya, they could be all witchkissed, resulting in a curse to heavy for humans to handle, he really wanted to fight, but something deep inside told him that it would be pointless, the blonde one tried to harden his expression and look away, deep down he was a coward, Yamaguchi just told him that he became a magical boy to be just as him, if Yamaguchi wanted to become a coward hiding himself in his sarcastic comments and cold looks, pushing people away, then Tsukishima prayed that such wish would never become true.

  
“Kei…. We’ve known each other for so long, I know that something’s happening with you, I know that this isn’t the best situation to talk about this but-   
“You are right.” Tsukishima replied, trying to appear tuff and distant once again, and somehow failing. “it isn’t important at all, I just spaced out ok….” But Tadashi wouldn’t buy those words.

  
“But I need to know, I need to know what are you going through” he said, as he took Tsukishima’s hands and held them. “and right now, if something happens…. I don’t want you to be left with guilt….” He didn’t want to believe that, they would definitively kill the witch, finish the training camp, and go back to their usual homes, talking about simple stuff, playing videogames, eating together in lunch, just as any other human, but the risk was high, there was no guarantee that they both would make it alive. “just let it out…” Tsukishima looked at him, his cold gaze broke into his genuine expression, tainted by sadness, the logical part of his brain told him to stop losing control over his emotion, if he did that, he would- he couldn’t keep it to himself anymore.

  
“I wished…for my brother to be the ace of Karasuno.” Tsukishima said, as he took a deep breath, trying to talk the most he could in the limited time they had until the witch found them. “after the day I found out he wasn’t a regular, he collapsed, he didn’t come out oh his room for days, I just wanted to make him happy…” Yamaguchi nodded, squeezing Tsukishima’s hand tightly as he went along. “but for my wish to come true, the original ace of Karasuno had to be erased…” as each word left his mouth, it felt like a weight being put aside, but his soul gem wouldn’t experience the same if it wasn’t for a grief seed.

“so what the wish did was incapacitating the team’s original ace, so that my brother could play as a new ace…” his words got cut once again, being reminded of his mistake would only make things worse, but Yamaguchi felt that he understood the situation better, he knew tsukki very well, but there were still some missing pieces. “So… you think that since your wish made someone suffer, anything you do will end up in suffering to someone else” Yamaguchi said, letting go of Tsukishima’s hands, to which Tsukishima nodded. “I want to make up for it….” He looked down at his hands. “I want to fix the damage that I did, but my wish can’t allow that… I want to fight too…” he gulped as he closed his eyes.

“but I feel like…. Everything I can do to help with curse someone… I prefer to escape the damage I will produce.” Yamaguchi heard the whole confession with a worried but reassuring expressions, it was also the first, and hopefully not the last moment where he opened up like that, and Yamaguchi would open up too.

  
“You are big dummy, huh tsukki?” Yamaguchi said, with a soft smile, those words were nothing Tsukishima expected, but remembering that Yamaguchi would join his sarcasm speeches from time to time, it wasn’t that surprising. “I can’t believe that you think that all you do will end up in a curse” Yamaguchi stood up. As he summoned his spear once again. “since the beginning, you were always there! Wherever I was sad or scared at something, you would cheer me up, in your unique way of course” Tsukishima remembered those moments, when they were just normal kids talking about dinosaurs or astronomy, their biggest concern being what restaurant should they go to order French fries and a burger, he really wanted to go back. “ you helped me to get here, that’s why I was always looking up to you, even if it’s annoying… if you think that everything you come on contact ends as a curse, then what am I supposed to be, am I a curse Tsukki?”

  
Kei looked up at Yamaguchi, for those moments he seemed so confident, the whole situation felt surreal, like a fever dream after overworking in practice, but it felt even weirder than that, something was off. “but… since you began following me… you turned into a magical boy, if it wasn’t for me you-“ Tsukishima’s words were stopped from escaping when Yamaguchi placed his finger in tsukki’s lips. “ don’t feel responsible of my own actions.” Yamaguchi said, as he removed his finger from the blond one’s mouth, and rather gave him a hand for him to stand up again. “ me turning into a magical boy was my idea, you shouldn’t feel guilty over those things you have no control over!” Tsukishima slowly stood up with Yamaguchi’s help, Tsukishima looked at his friend, those constellation that formed in his freckles, that rebellious hair, someone rather uncommon really told him that he shouldn’t be so hard on himself, but no matter how many times Yamaguchi could, and probably would repeat him the same, the guilt wouldn’t let him go, he could only look away from Yamaguchi, the green haired boy noticed this, and catched the blonde’s hands, squeezing them gently. “if you think that you make everything worse…. I’ll be the proof that you are wrong, WE are going to survive, once this is over, we could sneak to that restaurant a few blocks away, I’ll pay for whatever we eat!!!.

  
Tsukishima felt a weight drop to the ground, Yamaguchi was really a star, as bright as his blue soul gem, shining over a red and broken world, in hopes of making life grow back, his lips parted into a genuine smile. “thank you, Tadashi.” Yamaguchi chuckled.

  
“You don’t use Tadashi that often, do you?”

  
“ shut up!”

  
“Sorry Tsukki”

  
The both laughed for a second, before they heard a loud thump, that sound reminded them that they were still inside the witch labyrinth, and the witch probably found them, preparing to blow up the giant rock they were hiding behind, Tsukishima smirked, as he summoned his shield. “,you really are gonna pay for the both of us?”

  
“I don’t like to break promises, and to make this promise come true, we have to kill the witch.”  
“Sounds fair to me”  
Both of them jumped out of the way before the witch fired it’s fire beam, destroying the rock they were hiding behind, fragments of the rock fell from the air, as both of them were surrounded by more of the familiars, Tsukishima took a defensive position to protect Yamaguchi, while the smaller one would do the offensive moves, the familiars swarmed them, but Tsukishima blocked most of them with his shield, taking steady steps towards the witch, while Yamaguchi fired energy blasts from his spear, tearing apart the familiars that were attacking from the back.

  
“Ok so, killing familiars is easy and all but, how are we going to get rid of the witch?” Yamaguchi asked, he had no mayor strategy, Tsukki was about to say something, but they were cut off when the witch launched an energy blast, not as strong as the other ones, but still powerful, against them. “Stay behind me” Tsukishima said, as he activated his personal magic to boost his abilities. Yamaguchi followed, hiding behind Tsukishima’s back when the blast impacted the shield, the ground shacked for a moment, as flares of energy emerged from the impact, the blond one was beginning to be thrown behind, as the energy sphere tried to move forward, Yamaguchi tried to help too, putting his hands against the shield, to support it, Tsukishima gritted his teeth, trying to contain the impact.

  
“This is worse than what I thought” Tsukishima said, he also had in mind that his soul gem was contaminating at an alarming rate, so he had to rush this, if they wanted the both of them to make it out alive. 

  
“we need to hold it still!!” Yamaguchi yelled, as he tried to keep the shield in his place, Tsukishima then realized something, as the energy blast kept impacting the shield, the weapon was absorbing part of the energy of the impact, perhaps if they could use part of this energy…  
“I have an idea” the blonde one said, taking Yamaguchi by surprise, Tsukishima used some of his magic to power his body, and by using all of his force, he propelled the shield forward, and grabbed Yamaguchi to run away, the shield charged with energy flew until it crashed in an area full of familiars, producing a massive explosion, making flames erupt around the labyrinth, burning the remaining familiars.

  
“Tsukki!!” Yamaguchi squealed, as he looked at the surroundings, amazed by this new destructive potential they had. “how did you do it?”  
“As I used my shield to absorb the energy blast, some of the energy was absorbed by it” Tsukki said, as he summoned his shield once again, if we release that energy saved in the shield at once.”

  
“It causes a massive explosion” Yamaguchi completed, it was a good idea, they could use the witch’s own magic on itself, without dealing with the side effects. “so..what do you need me to do?” he said, as he put an arm around Tsukishima’s shoulder.  
Tsukishima wondered for a moment, and then he had another idea, “I need a good aim, and with the witch moving, it would be difficult to fire where I need to fire” yamaguchi quickly picked on what his friend wanted him to do.

  
“You can be the decoy” Tsukishima said, as the witch reappeared from the debris, the witch still had 1 snake arm attached to it, and that snake limb was coming for them at an uneven speed. “I need you to distract the snake while I block the witch’s energy beam, when you are in a good trajectory for me, I’ll give you a signal, so that you jump out of the way and I fire my shield against it”  
This plan seemed complicated, they had never practiced that kind of dynamic, but there was no time for that, they had to dispose of the witch right now.

“ok Tsukii!!!:

  
“Fine”

  
They both jumped into action, Yamaguchi began to run into another direction, the snake limb of the witch detached and followed him as planned, as Tsukishima rushed towards the witch, and as they had expected, the witch fired another energy beam towards him, but he used hid shield to block the attack, and to collect the witch’s energy by doing so.  
The snake began spitting toxic acid against Yamaguchi, some of it fell in the green boy’s arm, burning him a little.

“damn it!” he said under his breath, as he kept running, even if he was just a decoy, he could still fight, he used his spear to fire magic blast against the creature ,making the monster twist in pain, but that wouldn’t stop it, Yamaguchi kept running, he was scared obviously, something kept telling him that something was bad, but he decided to ignore it.

“Tsukki will get us out of here,” he thought, as he kept running away, to eventually make a comeback.  
Tsukishima’s legs hurt , he felt as every drip of magic was being drained from his soul gem, that had already turned into a brown hue, they really needed that grief seed, just when his legs were about to give up, he assumed that he had collected enough energy, he yelled.  
“Yamaguchi!!!! Come here!!”  
Yamaguchi heard him, and immediately changed his direction, now the snake was rushing towards Tsukishima’s direction, when the two were about to touch, Tsukishima gave the signal.

  
“Now!!”

  
Yamaguchi quickly jumped out of the monstrous familiar’s way, as Tsukishima jumped out of the beam’s way, and launched the shield towards the monster, when the shield impacted the snake’s skin, it detonated, setting the monstrosity on fire, Yamaguchi was almost blown away by the power of the impact, when the smoke cleared out, the smaller guy was again visible, as he jumped towards Tsukishima and hugged him.

  
“It’s working Tsukki!!! We now have a good plan”

  
“…yea, that’s right”

  
But their little moment was interrupted when they heard a loud growl that came from the witch’s direction, when all the smoke dissipated, the two boys gasped, the layers of cloth surrounding the witch were gone, revealing it’s boney interior, and the head of the witch had expanded, resembling the head of a shark, now with red flares coming from it’s empty eye sockets.

  
“we set it off apparently” Tsukishima chuckled, in a nervous way, Yamaguchi lost his grasp of Tsukishima’s body, and was about to say something, but the witch quickly fired a final ray of energy, this time the beam was completely dark, filled with curses, Tsukishima quickly reacted, summoning his shield again, and blocking the beam, but the impact was so strong it had blown the two several feet back, the two tried to hold the shield, but this attack was way too powerful comparing it to the witch’s other attacks, Yamaguchi and Tsukishima screamed, as they tried to use any magic they had left to resist, but this was just way too much.

  
“Ts-tsuki!!” Yamaguchi tried to say, but his body began to ache from holding back such a big attack, suddenly, Tsukishima groaned, Yamaguchi looked at him, and he saw with horror as his friend’s soul gem cracked.

  
“Tsukki!!!!!” Yamaguchi yelled, as he tried to push forward, but it was impossible, Tsukishima collapsed, maybe using too much magic had began to destroy his soul gem.

  
“All of this time…I’ve been running away, since turning into a magical boy, I hided from the truth, and I hid the truth from others… no matter the scenario, I always wanted to give up, and keep everything to myself.” He thought, as he felt his consciousness begin to drift away, but he glanced at Yamaguchi, they were so different, even if it didn’t seem like, Yamaguchi was so strong mentally, even if his magic was quite weak, if his serves were to weak, he kept going, at first he didn’t understood, why did he kept trying? But he understood, Yamaguchi found other reason to fight, not just to prove that he was strong, Yamaguchi Tadashi wanted to fight for Tsukishima Kei, for a normal future together.

  
A Future that would probably never happen, but that hope, even if it’s impossible, dreaming of their old life, laughing together, visiting the museums, listening to music, he wanted that, even if they were magical boys, they could still in a way accomplish such in some way.

  
“Live… I want to live, I want Tadashi to live.” He thought, he quickly stood up, and held the shield once again, Yamaguchi seemed altered naturally.  
“Tsukii!! Are you ok?”

  
“even if I don’t make it.. I’ll make sure that Tadashi lives” he thought. “I want to protect him, I want to dream of a happier future … even if it’s not possible, if he survives… that future might be possible in some day. 

  
Tsukishima grabbed Yamaguchi’s hand, and transferred some of his special magic to the green haired boy, busting their power. “let’s end this together” Tsukishima said, giving a determined smile, Yamaguchi couldn’t believe it, Tsukishima seemed to be determined, the boy that gave the minimal effort, the one who would give up always, was finally fighting for something, even if he didn’t knew about what, Yamaguchi smiled widely. “let’s do this!! Tsukii!!!”

  
“Of course”

  
The two boys used almost all their magic in launching the shield, filled with curses and magic from the witch, towards the creature, but the witch’s body stopped the shield from impacting, apparently the witch managed to create a force field around itself with it’s remaining magic. The shield would soon run out of energy and fall to the ground.

  
Tsukishima’s eyes opened widely, he wanted to say something, in the lines of “we can try something else, we have to try again” but Yamaguchi summoned his spear. “this is it!” the green haired boy yelled, as he jumped in the air, leaving Tsukishima in the ground.  
“Perhaps this will be enough” said Tsukishima, as he collapsed in his knees. Yamaguchi charged his spear with his magic, hopefully for the last time, and launched it at full speed.

  
“pioggia di stelle!!!” 

  
The spear impacted the shield, making it detonate, a loud explosion was started, blinding yamaguchi for a moment with all the light that emerged from it, with this extra help, the witch’s force field collapsed, the witch growled, as it’s body was set in flames.  
Yamaguchi fell to the groud, and stood up, there was a main prioriry right now, and it was called tsukishima kei.

  
“Tsukii!!!!” yamaguchi yelled, as he ran towards tsukishima, who was in the ground, holding himself with difficulty.

  
“The witch…” tsukishima said, making yamaguchi turned away, the witch in a moment of despair opened an exit gate, and entered it.  
“It’s escaping!!!” yamaguchi said, as he summoned his spear, but as he said that, the witch crossed the portal, closing it inmediatly.  
“It-escaped” tsukishima struggled to say.  
“Damn it!!!!: yamaguchi cursed, now they had no grief seeds, and their soul gems… tsukki’s soul gem… oh no.

  
“Are you ok tsukki??” yamaguchi kneeled down, looking at tsukishima, he was turning pale really fast, and his breathing was turning quite rough.  
“Don’t- worry about me right now” he tried to speak, but he couldn’t find much energy to do so, yamaguchi looked around his friend’s body , too see any serious damage, and when he looked at a certain part, he froze.

  
“Your soul gem…

  
  
Tsukishima’s soul gem was pitch black, with missing pieces all around it, little cracks forming around the bigger ones. “nonononono this can’t be” the green haired boy panicked, they had managed to almost defeat the witch, why was this happening? Why to them?.  
“I CAN FIX THIS!!!!” Yamaguchi said, as he began to shake, and his heart began to ache, this couldn’t be, hid friend was literally dying in front of him. “I’LL GET YOU A GRIEF SEED KEI!! PLEASE HANG IN THERE”  
But Tsukishima raised his hand, and grabbed Yamaguchi’s , he knew that Yamaguchi had no chance to kill a witch right now.  
“Don’t go…”  
“LET ME GO!!! I NEED TO GET YOU A GRIEF SEED!!!”  
“There’s no time for me..” Tsukihima said, as he felt his body growing colder, his heartbeat was slowing, he really was dying.  
“DON’T YOU FUCKING SAY THAT AGAIN!!!” Yamaguchi yelled at him, with tears in the corner of his eyes, he couldn’t breath, Tsukishima wasn’t dying, no way this was happening, his chest hurt, a few sobs escaped his mouth, this can’t be… I just wanted to be with you..

  
“The witch escaped with it’s grief seed, and there are no witches nearby… and you don’t have enough energy to kill one, this is how it is..” Tsukishima said softly, trying to sound strong, but he knew that his ending was near, it was painful, he would never be able to listen to soft pop music, or to read a cliché novel, or to play volleyball, or just being with his friend, his time was running out, the only good thing was that he had done something good for Yamaguchi for once.

  
“Don’t- don’t- do- don’t say that!!!! I NEED YOU!!! HOW CAN I- how can I live without you?” Yamaguchi’s eyes watered, as he tightened his grasp of Tsukishima’s hand, “we were supposed to get out of this together.. I HAD TO SAVE YOU!.”

  
Tsukishima chuckled, as he closed his eyes. “you already saved me…” Yamaguchi couldn’t hold it together anymore. “I had given up on everything… I wasn’t sure if I wanted to live like this, but you showed me… that I can still fight for someone, I wanted to fight with you.”

  
His soul gem started to crack even more, Yamaguchi no longer responded In his pain. “ I wanted to fight for you, even if it was for a moment.. having something to live for made me the happiest man in the world, and … maybe today I managed to save you… but you are dying too… “

  
Yamaguchi understood for a moment snapping out of panic, his own soul gem was almost completely tainted, he felt that his body was beginning to give up.

  
“But what is going to happen to you?? Why are you ok with this??” Yamaguchi began to cry shortly after over Tsukishima’s body, Kei slowly raised his hand and grabbed Tadashi’s face, and tried to comfort him for a moment, caressing his face.

  
“We have no grief seeds now, and you need one if you want to keep living, I want you to continue living… so I’ll get you a grief seed, even if it means that we can’t be together anymore.”

  
“Tsukki…” Yamaguchi collapsed, falling in Tsukishima’s body, tightly hugging him, he wouldn’t let Tsukki go away, no way

  
“Just finish me off when you think you are ready”

  
“Tsukki wait!!!. What was Tsukishima talking about, we wouldn’t turn into a-

  
“I’m sorry”

  
Tsukishima’s soul gem shattered, causing a big explosion, Yamaguchi was blown off several feet back, black smoke was coming from Tsukishima’s soul gem, the wind took Yamaguchi’s hat down, the explosion of energy was strong enough that it made the remains of the barrier collapse.

  


  
“Tsukkiii!!!” Yamaguchi yelled, but he was knocked out by a flying debris, as his vision blurred, he managed to make out between the smoke a spherical, grey object that was forming from Tsukishima’s soul gem, that object was awfully similar to Tsukishima’s soul gem.

  
“A grief seed…”

  
Yamaguchi lost his consciousness.

\--------------------------------

Darkness  
The only think Yamaguchi could recall, he slowly began to recover his senses, what had just happened?

  
He slowly opened his eyes once again, and when his vision adjusted, he could clearly see where he was, apparently he was now in a barrier, but, it looked different from the one they were before, this new barrier consisted of what seemed to be a giant volleyball court, on the bleachers at the sides, millions of purple eyes with no body connected to them were watching upon him, and when he looked up, he could see a giant half moon threatening to crash at any moment, a moon… 

  
Tsukki!!! Yamaguchi remembered, his last memory before he blacked out, Tsukishima’s soul gem had shattered, he had to find him, with no soul gem, he had no idea what would happen to tsukki, Yamaguchi began to look around, but the strong flashlights that came from all the sides of the giant stadium almost blinded him, he had to cover his eye with a hand, screaming his friend’s name

  
With each second, the possibility of finding Tsukki was less likely. “this isn’t real” Yamaguchi thought to himself. “this is only a nightmare” he negated it, he had nothing left now but denial, “we aren’t magical boys”.

  
He then saw him, Tsukishima’s body laid at the side of the court, Yamaguchi’s legs moved without much thinking. “we’ll wake up, I might be crying, but Tsukki will comfort me and say it was a bad dream”  
KEI!!! Yamaguchi yelled, as he sat near the blonde’s body, Tsukishima looked pale, his eyelids were closed shut, and he had transformed back into his civilian clothes, and Yamaguchi couldn’t see if he was breathing.

  
“a bad dream” 

  
“It has to be”

  
“Tsukki-please!!!!   
Wake up!!!” Yamaguchi tried to move Tsukishima’s empty body, expecting for him to wake up and hug him, or to at least to tell him to shut up, but nothing came out of the blonde’s mouth. Yamaguchi then got near and put his ear near Tsukishima’s chest, trying to find his friend’s heartbeat, but there was only silence.

  
His heart had stopped working.

  
He was dead.

  
Yamaguchi stopped moving, his mind no longer made sense of the situation, this couldn’t be happening, they were supposed to be playing volleyball, to enjoy their company, to eat junk food, talking about crushes, a typical teenager’s life, but not this.

  
Anything but this.  
“You should stopped trying to make that empty shell move” Yamaguchi heard a voice, it was familiar, he then looked at his right, and there it was. “kyubbey…”  
“DON’T JUST STAND THERE!!!” Yamaguchi screamed, as he grabbed the white cat by the neck, threatening to strangle him. “help Tsukki!!! Don’t let Tsukishima die!!!”

  
Kyubbey sighted, as he would have to once again explain the system to another magical boy. “Yamaguchi, that body is no longer Tsukishima Kei, you are only holding an empty shell”

  
Yamaguchi didn’t understand, what was he talking about now? “what are you-?” kyubbey continued. “the real Tsukishima Kei was inside his soul gem, that is part of the contract” Yamaguchi couldn’t process a single word from kyubbey, his brain had shut down completely. “I-“

  
“Part of my duty as an incubator is to take the soul of the magical boys, and turn it into soul gems. That way no matter how much damage your old body receives, as long as your soul gem doesn’t get shattered, you can just heal your old body and go back to fighting.” kyubbey said, as he looked at the empty shell that used to be Tsukishima Kei, Yamaguchi stared into the ground, as he took his soul gem, or his soul to be more specific, if all this time their real bodies were now soul gems… they seemed like zombies… but as he remembered what had happened to Tsukishima’s soul gem, his heart stopped for a moment. 

  
“Then where is Tsukki’s soul gem?” Yamaguchi demanded to know, looking furious, this was all the damn cat’s fault, it never told him about this, he was basically a zombie now, and his friend was-  
“Where is Kei?

  
Kyubbey looked at Yamaguchi dead in the eyes, with no emotion visible, “turn around” the white fairy said, Yamaguchi slowly turned around, and he felt his blood freeze, a giant witch, consisting of a dinosaur skeleton, covered by vines and cloth, two giant eyeballs coming from it, and several mouths emitting a rather pained laugh. This had to be a joke.  
Yamaguchi started to laugh, his voice was strained and only a miserable pained chuckle came, there was no way this was real, Kei was only fooling him, he would appear at any moment, this was all a sick joke “this isn’t real” he said, as he turned back.

  
“This isn’t real”

  
“this isn’t real”

  
“It is real” the white cat said. “Tsukishima kei has finally completed his duty as a magical boy, killing witches, and now he has transformed into a witch himself.”

  
“No…”  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I was kinda dead for s month, but expect the finale in a few weeks!!
> 
> (I also tried to make a comic but.. it ain't that good)


End file.
